I'll Take Care of You
by MrSchimpf
Summary: Amanda·Quinn. Quinn is new to her job, but she already knows she must protect her charge at any cost.


**Title: ****I'll Take Care of You  
****Author: **Nate  
**Pairing:** Quinn/Amanda, friendship  
**Spoilers:** "Sweet Baby" and "Dirty Little Secrets", nothing in the future.  
**Rating:** PG (beyond talk of suicide, completely a character piece with the worst thing happening being talking in traffic)  
**Disclaimer:** _Scandal _is the property of Shonda Rhimes, Betsy Beers and ABC Studios. Descriptions of where I think the OP&A offices and driving paths were taken off Streets & Trips and don't reflect the actual show (which has made the location vague so far).  
**Archiving: **My personal Tumblr and LiveJournal, and ff·net. Anywhere else, ask first.  
**Summary:** Quinn is new to her job, but she already knows she must protect her charge at any cost.  
**Author's** **Notes: **I have been raring to write this story since the episode ended on Thursday night (note, this was written after the second episode aired, but I had to wait for ff·net to put up the show here), and I was disappointed to find out there was nowhere I could really post this story yet. still has no category for the show (you'd think someone would've told them before the 5th), and there's no way I'm putting it in the miscellaneous category with the gobs of terrible One Direction stories in there, so I'm putting this on my Tumblr first.

I'm just glad to have another great fandom to follow, and thanks to the strong fandom I've seen developing around the show already. It's a well-written show, and although the Twittersphere seems to be against Quinn so far, I actually like her and how Katie Lowes plays her as harried, yet vulnerable. And thanks to Liza Weil for playing yet another awesome character with a vague good/bad thing going on.

This story is just a one-shot so no continuation will be had. But hopefully my dip into this fandom will prove worthy of your reading and reviewing.

* * *

Quinn Perkins's life had changed within it seemed the blink of an eye. One day she was just another girl out of law school looking for a job in the struggling economy, but within just the space of a few days, she was now the new prot?in the office of one of the most influential people in the Beltway.

And now she was driving back to the offices of Oliva Pope & Associates, with a shaken young woman in tow who could with a mere statement take down the most powerful man in the world. The woman stared at the small form of Amanda Tanner in the front seat, her hands shaking as the blonde woman had been assured by Quinn that her very life would be protected by Olivia.

Amanda had been shaken by the call by her parents. She had no idea how even the smallest morsel of news in Washington, on a blog on the lowest DC paper on the totem which looked right out of 2003, could quickly reverberate like a stone skipping on the Potomac, each skip acting as a retweet or a Facebook share spreading the rumor quickly towards Politico or the desk of Chuck Todd. It was up to Olivia to catch it before it made another skip away from the side of politics where only the paranoid and conspiracy theorists went.

Quinn made a turn to look at the woman as they came to a stop at the light to go onto 7th NW from Independence Avenue. She was still new at crisis management, hardly having time to get to know everyone at the office. All she knew right now was it was her job to make sure Amanda didn't stray out of her sight, something she had failed to do when she snuck out of the hospital.

She wasn't about to do that again, but for a reason that wasn't wholly related to Olivia's command to get her back to the offices at Eye and 6th NW.

Truly, Quinn did believe the woman's story. She had not heard specifics at all, but she could just tell. All the time she spent at the hospital guarding the woman, especially when the writer hoped to get something...anything out of her. She was relieved not to have divulged anything, but still felt afraid one slip-up with Amanda and she wouldn't find herself with a job.

Amanda turned around in her seat, feeling Quinn's stare upon her. She took in a deep breath, still feeling slight guilt from running away and somehow seeing Quinn as the only one who could protect her at this point. With a small grimace, she decided to be a little more vocal with the woman, thankful for the privacy of the car.

"I...I just wanted to say, um...thank you." She tossed back a tendril of her hair, her shaky voice struggling to show her emotion. "For staying with me. I...I did see you with that guy out there. Trying to stop him."

Quinn nodded. "I just didn't trust him. I knew he wasn't family because...he didn't have your looks in any way. Of course, your family isn't here and..." She bit on her lip. "You know I was there at the park. I didn't know Olivia had that much information on you."

Another pause. Amanda was shocked about some of the information divulged there, including how many sexual partners she had. "You...you don't believe I was that...active?"

"I'm not sure," Quinn said honestly. "We barely know each other. I barely know this town. But Olivia is thorough. Maybe too much. Harrison knew so much about me when he gave me my 'interview' I thought he stalked me on Facebook, but it's nothing compared to the detail she found out about you." Quinn's voice shuddered, as she still felt the deep invasion of Amanda's privacy was unwarranted. "She found out all of that and then she stopped you from coming in the office-"

There was a sudden pause as both of them found Amanda's suicide attempt front and center in that moment. The light turned green and Quinn made the turn onto 7th, both of them glad for the small pause to find where they stood. The blonde woman held back tears, her wrist still stinging from the attempt on her life, which she knew was monumentally stupid in the grand scheme, as she knew it could have imperiled everything.

"I just didn't know where to go," she said aloud. "This woman came out of nowhere telling me my career was over and I believed it. And I thought then that my life was too. It...it was dark and I was-" She felt a hand on top of hers suddenly as Quinn clasped it in hers, giving a look as she was thankful for no traffic around for a quarter mile.

"It's over now though," she assured. "I promise you though now that we're taking you on, just leave it to us." A pause. "Leave it to me." She took in a deep breath, knowing the little she shared about her own life would help Amanda understand. "I might've started just taking this on to get experience, but listening to your story, feeling your struggle, I have to take it personal now. We both have to see this through, no matter the peril we go through."

Amanda relaxed a little with Quinn's hand in hers. It was hardly professional, but it was just what she needed in that moment to kill the urge to throw herself out of the car and go it alone again. She couldn't get through this, drop it, leave her parents and family back home to the wolves. If this is what it took to be vindicated, she had to go through it all.

Even if Olivia had her skepticism about everything and had basically fought her at her apartment door, Amanda knew Quinn was still there, observing, ever since she went to the hospital. She saw in the young woman that someone in the world believed her. The sight of Quinn at the Memorial was a relief, and she could hold out hope that despite her obvious inexperience, she could see everything through and be her moral support.

Amanda nodded, her deep brown eyes seeing some light for the first time since Olivia had come to her. "It's a promise?"

With a nod, Quinn assured her it was. "Anytime. You have my number whenever you need it." Quinn realized what she said and wanted to backtrack it a bit. "Uhh, please doing tell Liv I take it personal, I didn't-"

"I won't," Amanda said. "Like I won't say anything about your...stuff." The dark-haired woman gave a little smile, relieved the alleged paramour was at least being slightly friendly with her.

"Thanks." The rest of the ride to the office was mainly quiet beyond the click of the turn signal and an occasional bump along the road as both women calmed themselves for the first meeting with Olivia.

Their hands never broke contact until Quinn parked in the garage.

* * *

_**THE END.**_


End file.
